Looking back at the weekly messages of Father Paul Counce, first published in The Carpenter, our weekly Parish Bulletin
Published: September 08, 2019
Dear Parishioners and Friends,
As you can probably guess, it has been a wild couple of weeks for me. The week before last, I celebrated the 40th anniversary of my priestly ordination, and last week took five days off to share a long-planned, too-brief getaway with four priest friends. Both of these were wonderful and more enjoyable than I’d dared to hope-for.
Yet smashed into the same time-frame were two sad events that also took up lots of time, planning and prayer. The worst was when one of my sisters, Amy, returned home to the Lord on Monday, August 19, after a two-plus year battle with ovarian cancer. It was a tragic death, for she was someone full of brilliance and love and energy until the end. Fortunately, hers also was a peaceful passing, for my siblings – and here I have to single out especially my sister Julie Brignac, who provided the lion’s share of care for her whenever she needed it – saw to it that she was lovingly accompanied and assisted the whole way, especially in the last few weeks. If you get this issue of The Carpenter early, or regularly access our Parish’s website www.cathedralbr.org or Facebook, you’ll know that I will celebrate a Memorial Mass here for Amy on Friday, September 6, at 6:30 pm.
That same sad week also saw the death of former Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco. Before moving on to her lying in State in the Capitol rotunda, her funeral services began here, with an interfaith service that I thought was a profoundly moving time of prayer. I was pleased we could host that ceremony, and I couldn’t help but recall the many other times she worshiped here at the Cathedral while she was a parishioner, living in the Governor’s mansion down the street. Her official Inaugural Mass was here back in January of 2004 but I suspect it was the reassuring rhythm of prayer when she came to many “plain old” Sunday and daily Masses that she depended on more. She was a woman of deep faith, and I know that being united to Christ’s Passion in the Eucharist sustained her and gave her comfort in the most challenging times.
Please hold both of these ladies up to the Lord in your own prayers. To be generously loving in life and prayerfully remembered in death are profound graces, and they are intertwined, for the latter almost always depends on the former!
This weekend one more “happy” moment will be ours at the Cathedral. This Sunday, September 8, a large number from our Permanent Deacon community – both those already ordained and those preparing for the Sacrament of Holy Orders, and their wives – will assemble with Bishop Michael Duca and Father Jamin David, who heads our Diaconate Formation programs. They will celebrate an annual “Back to School” Mass and luncheon, but this year they’re also adding something a bit different: during the celebration of our 10:30 am Eucharist the class of 2020 will be canonically admitted as Candidates for Sacred Ordination; the class of 2021 will be formally instituted in the Ministry of Acolyte; and the class of 2022 will be formally installed in the Ministry of Lector in the Church.
It is no big secret that in many places, permanent deacons outnumber diocesan priests (it’s true here in Baton Rouge: by my quick count we have 61 active diocesan deacons and only 52 active diocesan priests). Although ordained for service “in charity” and not for governance and sanctification “in persona Christi,” they form a corps of ministers that is increasingly more important in the Church. We must not only keep them in our prayers but encourage more and more committed Catholic men to consider the diaconate as a supplementary vocation!
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Paul Counce
